CUTIE!!!

Heehee - I snapped this picture of Evelyn yesterday! Look at that smile!!!!

Christmas!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

We have had a wonderful holiday break so far. We just LOVE having daddy home!! My grandma was in town and so we had everyone up for dinner and went out for lunch. We had a great time being with family. That is always one of my favorite parts about the holidays is the chance to spend time together as a family.

Monday we took the girls to Walmart so that they could pick out gifts for each other. They picked out very sweet gifts and were so excited to surprise each other with their gifts. This is the hug after opening!
The kids had fun opening their gifts. I got creative this year and crocheted dresses for their cabbage patch dolls. Anna has been busy putting the dresses on the stuffed animals and all her dolls. Eileen immediatly dressed her cabbage patch doll and then left it dressed. Here's Aaron in the hat and mittens we got him. He's so cute!!

The kids final present was a fish tank. Dan found a really good deal and the kids have been asking for pets.... :) Tomorrow we are going to go to the pet store to let them pick out some fish.

We also got a white Christmas - for the first time, our family saw snow on the ground on Christmas morning. It made for some treacherous walking, but the streets weren't too bad! :)

We feel so blessed this Holiday season for our wonderful family, and especially grateful for the chance to see family we don't get to see much and the chance to talk to Dan's parents on their mission. We can't wait to see them in a few months! We feel blessed for the amazing people in our ward who love and serve us in so many ways - I hope I can repay all that has been done for us. We are especially grateful for our Savior who's birth we celebrate and the love that He gives!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!! - it truly is the most wonderful time of the year

VACATION!!!!

Thank goodness - It's the holidays.... It's so nice to have my husband around!! Just a few funny things from last week.... :)

Eileen told me after finishing lunch (during which she had a banana) that she had eaten a "mutilated banana"

Aaron loves to see Christmas lights. Anytime we drive around when it is dark, he points at EVERY light he sees and says "Light Light" - and with all the Christmas lights, that means he is saying "Light Light" the whole time!

We had fun last night making and decorating cookies. The kids loved cutting them out and sneaking tastes of the dough and the frosting. When i made the dough for the cookies, I made it Sunday morning (because it needs to chill) and realized that we didn't have enough flour. So I used the cake flour that we had in our pantry... but it still wasn't enough... so we ground up oatmeal to make oatmeal flour.... At least they tasted good. :)

Anyway - counting down to Christmas and enjoing some family time! :) It sure is exhausting...gotta go to bed... :)

Busy, Busy!

We've had a busy week!! Dan was gone for his usual wrestling and young men's. I had a Relief Society Meeting this week and our ward Christmas Party.

I attempted a trip to the grocery store with all four kids this week....not the brightest idea - Aaron is still too young to understand the idea of staying next to me! And Anna would touch everything - so Aaron would have to go touch everything too. I've got one more idea as to how to make this possible without losing my sanity in the process - I'll let you know how it goes tomorrow.... :)

I can't believe Evie is almost 3 months old - the last 3 months have just FLOWN! She is such a sweet little girl - she smiles and her whole face just lights up - it's beautiful! She is growing so fast - she is lifting her head up so well now.

Eileen and Anna are so fun to watch together - they play so well together and it's so fun to listen to their made up stories and to see their different personalities as they play.

Aaron is the little copy cat - he wants to do everything that his sisters are doing - which means that he spends a lot of time playing with princesses and baby dolls... Dan is thinking he needs some manly toys for Christmas! He's also looking around the ward for families with boy that we can hang out with to teach him how to "play like a boy." He's such a sweetie though. He is talking so much now - lots of it is just mimicking his sisters, but his vocabulary is steadily growing. We also have some friends with little boys near his age and it's been fun to play with them and watch him learning to play with other kids his age.

Hair

Eileen loves doing my hair. She puts pony tails in (up to 9 of them) and then all the hair clips she can find - the record right now is standing at 49 little clips in my hair. Today while she sat and did my hair, she stood behind me and did my hair while she gave lessons on how to do hair. She stood behind me saying things like "And then you grab the hair and put this around it and twist is and put it here" And putting clips in my hair, telling her imaginary audience how to get the maximum number of clips in and how each clip went in. Here are some pics of the hair stylist with me after she did my hair. She had only gotten 23 clips in this time! :)

Happy Thanksgiving!!

One of the perks of having a school teacher for a husband is that we got him home for the WHOLE week!!! Now that's a happy holiday! Dan and I had lots of things we wanted to get done this week - he got all of his done - I got about half way through mine.... We didn't "go anywhere" for the holidays - traveling with 4 young kids is not something we are willing to put ourselves through very often - especially now that any trips need to be driving for cost sake! We spent Thanksgiving Day at my parents house down in Plano with my parents and my sister and brother-in-law. We had a great time! The food was great and the company was great! Our kids just LOVE their grandparents and aunt and uncle! Of course I brought the camera to this family holiday... and of course I forgot to get it out..... :)

Saturday we took our annual trip up to the Christmas Tree farm to get our Christmas Tree. We brought some Christmas movies for the kids to watch and then had fun running around playing in the leaves looking at trees and taking a ride behind the tractor.

Today in the car as we headed to church, I had gotten very tired of Eileen's grumpy attitude, so we decided to play a little game called the Thankful game. we each took turns telling things that we are grateful for. Eileen passed her first too turns because she was too grumpy to come up with anything. Anna REALLY got into it and was very sweet. Eileen finally dispelled her gloomy cloud and got into it too. I'm thankful for so many things - and topping the list are the 5 people I see everyday!

YEY!!!!!!!!!

Well we survived to Dan's first big break - I'm really starting to wonder where this year has gone! This week has been mostly uneventful - we haven't gone too many places since the kids have been a bit sick this week. Monday we went for Evie's 2 month old check up. I'm really not sure where the last 2 months have gone - yet I can't imagine our family with out her!! She is such a sweetie. She is growing well and developing normally!

After we went to get her pictures taken - I forgot to bring her dress for pictures, so we glanced at what J.C. Penny's had on sale, and found this darling little dress!! She just looked like a little angel in it! Unfortunately on the way from the lobby to the picture studio - she pooped all over the dress, the floor and me... Thankfully they had Shout wipes and the photographer was able to hide the stained part.... :) She was soo sweet - but a bit cranky after all the cleaning up and bouncing around! Still we got some very sweet shots!

Eileen making funny faces after baths
Anna holding Evie - such a sweet big sister!!
Aaron learned to play with his food from his sisters....

Thankfully we are all feeling a bit better and are looking forward to having Dan home all next week - so much so that Dan and I have each made ourselves lists of what we want to get done... hopefully we get it all done with out exhausting ourselves!! :)

It has begun.....

What is it? - well 'it' could probably be many things - but the 'it' I'm talking about here is Wrestling Season. For those of you who don't know, that means that my sweet hubby is going to be gone every Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday night for his calling or for wrestling (except holidays) until March. The best that can be said of this is that it reminds all of us (as if we really needed a reminder) of what an amazing husband and father Dan is!! If you want proof - just listen to this conversation that Eileen and Dan had this afternoon -

Eileen: Lets play married daddy!
Dan: I'm already married.
Eileen: no just pretend daddy!!
Dan: ok so are you going to cook and clean?
Eileen: no that's what you do!
Dan: what do you do?
Eileen: I just sit and feed the baby

LOL - I am soo blessed to have a hubby who can make dinner while I worry about Evie.

We also took Eileen in for her 5 year old check up and everything is great! She is doing well socially and academically - and she is in the 50th percentileon her stats - so she is average size. In mommy terms that means she is beautiful, brilliant, gregarious and sweet!
Want proof? These are from her little photo session at J.C. Penny's
In other news - Aaron got his stitches out and has been picking at it ever since - so it's been bleeding all week. But life is good!

Events

Well this has been an eventful week for us. We had two big family events this week. Eileen's 5th Birthday was on Monday. I can't believe my little girl is 5 years old. She is such an amazing little girl and I feel so blessed to have her as part of our family. She is so sweet and creative and energetic and fun. She got to celebrate her birthday with her favorite dinner (Dutch Babies - kinda like pancakes....) and making cake with Daddy. (Haha - if you can't tell, there are two candles on that cupcake - a '2' and a '3' to make 5...)


Then she had a small party with some of her friends on Saturday. We played duck duck goose, hide and seek, and anything else we could come up with. Then since the weather has been beautiful, we sent them outside to play while we made pizzas for lunch. Each of these kids mothers is a friend of mine and I'm amazed at the talented women I am friends with!! Eileen got a beautiful hand made necklace which matches one that I got for my birthday (from the same friend.) She got an adorable crocheted hat and sewn apron from another friend and a cute little hair clip holder to hang up on her wall. Her final gift was a set of GIANT coloring princess pictures. She and Anna spent the entire rest of the day coloring those!!

Her final celebration was this evening at my parents house. We all got together for dinner, cake, ice cream and presents. Eileen got lots of cute clothes and some fun toys. It's so funny to see how excited she gets about the clothes!

Also today we blessed Evelyn. My Dad and Jon and Sandi came up to participate. The blessing was beautiful. As I listened (or tried to with the three other kids climbing all over me!) I was struck by the feeling that this sweet baby has been placed in our home and our family for a reason. That she belongs here - with us - now. Some people think I'm crazy having 4 kids in 5 years, and maybe I am - but there is nothing I would change!! Here are some pictures from after the blessing. The dress is one that I made - it's a good thing we didn't wait any longer to do the blessing - it barely fit!!!

Our big happy family!!

And Pours.....

This happened shortly before we were supposed to leave to go pick up Dan from the airport....
He was really good while they stitched him up - sat very still - the doctor and nurses were very impressed.... too bad he can't sit still any other time.... :P

When it Rains....

It Pours!!!! And for once, I'm not talking about the weather. The weather here has actually been really nice the last few days or so. Cool, sunny and perfect for being outside! Unfortunately I've been too sick to want to leave my bed, let alone the house. Despite this cold, I sent my sweet hubby off this weekend to go to his Grandmother's funeral. She was an amazing woman who left this world at peace and having left a legacy of love, hard work, faith, and a sense of humor. Though we couldn't afford for the whole family to go, we found an inexpensive ticket so Dan could. The day he left, my mom, the kids and I all made a quick run to Wal-Mart. When we got out, our new van wouldn't start.... With the help of my mom and some wonderful neighbors, we were able to get all of us home in two trips and then the dealership sent a tow truck to get the van. That night, we bundled the kids up in their costumes for a Trunk or Treat with our ward.

The next day I had to try and find some way to pick up my van - thankfully I have family near by who are able to help out, and my dad was able to come up while I was picked up in a stinky shuttle to go get it. Then after searching for a pumpkin he helped carve pumpkins with the kids.
Here are my adorable little butterfly, cow girl and pirate!
And of course can't forget my sweet little flower!
Now I'm afraid that Evie has caught the cold that I still haven't managed to get rid of!! All that has meant so far is a small fever and more snuggle time for me since she is a bit cranky, so hopefully this is as bad as it gets!

Dan comes home tomorrow - I'm glad he had the chance to go, but we've missed him and can't wait to have him back!!!

No more germs PLEASE!!!

Well - we've been fighting off a cold at our house for awhile now... yesterday, we lost the battle. I crashed and slept almost all day (miserably failing to get ANYTHING on my long to-do list done) Eileen and Anna have been running mild fevers and Aaron and Eileen have been coughing up lungs. After two days of sleeping I think I'm mostly recovered.
I am so blessed to have made some wonderful friends here. One WONDERFUL friend noticed today when our family didn't make it to church (can you imagine Eileen up there for her primary program singing "I am a builder, building my *cough cough* family") and called and offered to bring us dinner. And not just any dinner - but an incredibly yummy dinner, with desert and all!
Now we are praying that Evie says healthy!

Pumpkin Patch

Yesterday we went out to the Pumpkin Patch! The kids really had a blast! They climbed all over everything, ran through the maze, played in all the jump houses and checked out all the pumpkins! Got their faces painted and got wagon rides.


Anna is just fearless! She loved the inflatable obstacle course and slide. She climbed right in and had a blast! Eileen after seeing Anna do them was quick to do them also. Aaron was not so enthusiastic. He went into one of the bounce houses and didn't like it and would NOT go back in! LOL He wouldn't let Grandma put him down for awhile after that! He did love climbing on the more stationary things though. He loved the tractors and trains.

Eileen and Anna got their faces painted - Eileen got Nemo and Anna got a snake. Then we played around the pumpkins for a bit before heading out. We went to lunch with Grandma and Grandpa on the way home, then collapsed exhausted at the house.

Evelyn just slept the whole time... But we're sure she had a blast too... :)

This morning we went to Grandma and Grandpa's house to celebrate my mom's birthday. Kids loved helping to open the presents. We decided to only give the kids bubble wrap and tissue paper for Christmas this year since that was their favorite part anyway... :)

One Month Old!!!

I can hardly believe my little girl is one month old! What a month!! She has grown so much. She is now up to 8 lb 9 oz. She is sleeping pretty well, nursing is going much better and all in all life is good! The kids are helpful and are only going a little stir crazy! :) We actually attempted a couple outings this week. We went to a friend's house to play and even attempted the library.

He's at 'That Age'

I had turned around for no more than 5 minutes.......


That's all I gotta say!

My kids are sooooo sweet!!!

Two quick stories....

We decided to attempt the grocery store this morning. As we walked over to the produce area, I told the kids they could each pick some fruit to take home. Eileen promptly walked over to the huge apple display. Anna shyly told me that she wanted Corn on the Cob! A minute later I told them I wanted to grab some broccoli too, and Anna goes "BROKEEE BROKEEE BROKEE!!!!!" Haha - my kids love veggies! :)

I was sitting and trying to nurse Evie and I hear the water going on in the kitchen. When I check on Eileen a few minutes later - I find her doing all the lunch dishes in the sink! What a sweet little helper!

Two Weeks already!!

We took Evie in for her 2 week check up this week. She is growing well!! She is up to 7 lb 5 oz and 20 3/4 inches long. That puts her in the 25th percentile for both. Strangely enough she is only in the 5th percentile for head size. She officially has the smallest head out of all our kids - maybe that's why she came out so fast....

I went in to see a lactation consultant this week to see if we could figure out this whole nursing thing. We were able to make it work there and then of course I had a hard time getting it to work again once I got home.... But we are making it work.
This weekend was General Conference weekend. Today was really nice. The kids were fairly well behaved and let Dan and I listen to the addresses and even paid some attention. Saturday was another story.... Dan had a competition this weekend and was gone from 4 am to 10 pm.... I told him he's not allowed to leave me again until Evie learns to nurse. Too bad he still has to go to work.... When he got home and asked how my day went i just told him "You don't want to know" It seems like kids have a knack for knowing when they can cause trouble and you are unable to do anything about it but get upset! At least my kids do!!

Nursing Woes

Well - little Evie has passed the one week old mark and already she has some very noticeable likes and dislikes.

Likes: Bother and Sisters playing with her
Sleeping - especially with Daddy and Mommy
Snuggling
Dislikes: Diaper Changes
Eating mommy's milk

She is such a sweetheart! But mommy is sad - she doesn't like me when it comes to eating. She absolutely refuses to breast feed. She doesn't even seem to like my milk at all - but since she can't push the bottle out of her mouth she has to eat it anyway. I feel a bit like a failure - plus when you add up all the pumping, and feeding and cleaning bottles- that means I'm spending like 10 hours a day just getting food into her stomach!!! So I'm hoping a solution will magically present itself to us, because I'd really rather not go to formula this soon, and that this will somehow magically start to work because otherwise I'm not sure how long this will last...
The older kids had an eventful week. They got to go out and play with friends every day this week. Courtesy of a WONDERFUL ward, the kids have had a blast hanging out with friends and mommy has gotten some much needed rest. Also, we have had a week full of yummy meals brought to us! The kindness of these amazing sisters has just floored me!!! What wonderful friends we have!! I just hope that someday I'm able to pay it forward. These wonderful people have truly been angels at this crazy time in our lives.

The Beauty Salon??

Eileen was playing with her make up kit during quiet time yesterday. She came in after a couple of minutes and wanted to put some on me. Then a few minutes later she comes back and tells me that baby Evelyn should have some make up too. When I went out to look at her, this is what I found.... :)
LOL - I explained that she was probably too young for make up, but it was hard to keep a straight face when she looked so cute! :)

Life is Beautiful!

Especially my family! Not much has happened since my last post, but we are adjusting and getting used to life with 4 kids. Evie actually slept well last night, so we are feeling pretty good today.

We took her in to the hospital today to check her bili reuban levels and talk to a lactation consultant. Evie's levels are a little high, but now that my milk is in and we are getting more food down her, they should go up, so we have another check up tomorrow, and hopefully we will not have to put her under the lights.

The kids are adjusting pretty well, they love their baby sister and want to hold her all the time. The girls have started putting their baby dolls in all the baby stuff (swing, car seat, bouncer...) and Aaron is constantly bringing me baby stuff for her. He is so sweet!

Say Cheese beautiful girl!!

Welcome Home!!

Evie and I are officially home from the hospital! We are both doing well and now we are adjusting to the noisy life at home!! She was born Wednesday morning at 11:59 am. All went well with the labor and delivery. She weighed in at 7 lb 2 oz and is 19 inches long. She has just a bit of dark fuzzy hair and has hardly opened her eyes since she was born! (opens her mouth plenty, just not her eyes!) She is sweet and snuggly and totally adored by her older siblings.

Dan brought the kids in to visit a few times and they loved holding and helping with her. Now the hard part is going to make sure they don't smother her with their help! Aaron really did so much better than I thought. Either his sisters enthusiasm was infectious, or he somehow already gets that she belongs with our family. He has been SO sweet with her!!
Anna is constantly asking to hold her and is very sweet helping take care of her and making sure she has what she needs. She is constantly talking about her "newborn baby"Eileen is, of course, totally enamored with her. She is already becoming a little mommy. She wants to know exactly what I'm doing with Evie and why!

My parents and sister were in and out a bunch to help and visit.
So there you have it - we are now a family of 6. And here is a closeer view of my beautiful little baby all snuggled up in the set mommy made for her.